A/N: Almost forgot I meant to do this today! *bright smile* Goes to show I really should have done it last night, as late as I was up.

Thank you to jy24, Lena-luvs-cats, and Shadow Spears for reviewing!

Title: Sunlit Scales

Author: liketolaugh

Rating: T

Pairings: Link/Allen

Genre: Romance/Drama

Warnings: None

Summary: Link didn't expect his net to catch a merman. He definitely didn't expect the merman to come back. And he never would have imagined that this would lead to an attack that threatened to put the merpeople under Leverrier's control for the rest of their lives.

Disclaimer: Like hell I own D. Gray-man.

It was warm. Allen was laying half-in and half-out of water, and the surface he laid on was as smooth as the surface of a pearl. He was also stuck in something that was far too small, and his head ached.

Wearily, he blinked his eyes open and started to stretch, but was cut off as his tail thunked against something. Startled, he sat up and looked around.

He was in a small room, dry, with wooden walls and little decoration. There was a shelf with a few bottles, a bar of soap, and a closed cupboard. Allen himself was in a tin tub just big enough to accommodate him, filled with water that, now that he was sitting up, reached just to the bottom of his gills, a little above the base of his ribcage.

From the other side of the rough wooden door, Allen could hear the sounds of footsteps and muffled thumps, more of the latter than the former, and a faint sizzling sound.

Allen frowned and looked down to check himself over. There were bandages wrapped snugly around his tail, and more on his arm. Reaching up, he felt cloth around his throat, too. His tattered tail fin had been sewn up in tiny, neat little stitches, so that it almost looked intact.

Now that he was more awake (if still not in the best condition of his life) he noticed that he still ached dully where the net had cut into him. But he was alive. Not just that, he was on land. Had the fisherman…?

A disconcerted flick of his tail sent water splashing across the floor. Allen yelped. The sounds in the other room stopped, but Allen was more concerned with the mess he'd just made, leaning over the side of the tub to peer anxiously at the dark spots now scattered across the rough wooden floor.

"Ahem."

Allen yelped again and pushed himself up to stare, wide-eyed, at the blond man now standing in the doorway, looking somewhere between amused and exasperated. Bright light spilled from behind him, hurting Allen's eyes a little before he adjusted.

"Um," Allen said. The fisherman raised one eyebrow, and he stopped, blushing slightly in embarrassment and shame.

"I see you've woken up," the human said ironically, crossing the room to crouch beside Allen, who didn't take his eyes off of him. And then, somewhat more gently, "You seem much better."

Allen blushed again. "I'm sorry for fainting on you like that," he murmured, looking down.

"Never mind," the man dismissed, shaking his head. "Clearly you couldn't have made it home regardless." The blond studied Allen for a minute, and the merman couldn't help but squirm. All the human did, though, was say, "My name is Howard Link; you may call me Link. What is yours?"

Allen relaxed slightly, the webbed fingers of his right hand curling over the edge of the tub. "Allen Walker. It's nice to meet you."

"And to meet you as well," Link returned curtly, watching him with a slight frown.

"Thank you for taking care of me," Allen added, smiling apologetically. His tail flexed slightly under the rim of the tub; the water swirled but did not splash out of the tub this time. "I know it must be a bother."

Link shrugged. "I caused the injuries, therefore they are my responsibility."

Allen laughed, leaning against the side a little more. "Still, thank you."

Now Link was blushing slightly as well. "You're welcome." He cleared his throat and looked away, and abruptly moved to open the cupboard. He rummaged around in it for a moment, and then pulled out a roll of the same cloth that covered Allen's wounds. "May I remove you from the water? I need to change your bandages."

"Oh!" Allen sat up, displacing the water enough to send it swaying again. "Go ahead, I suppose."

Allen was a little reluctant, knowing how helpless he was out of the water, but then again, in a tub this small, he was plenty helpless in the water, too. Besides, he still didn't feel well enough to resist.

Link nodded in acknowledgement, set the bandages down, and rolled up his sleeves. Then he leaned over and, surprisingly carefully, picked Allen up out of the water, as easily as if he weighed nothing. Allen held himself very still, worried that any sudden motion would make the man drop him and a little nauseated by the abrupt movement.

He needn't have worried; Link didn't carry him very far, instead setting him down so his tail was stretched out on the rough wood floor and his back against the wall. Allen set his hands on the floor to steady himself, feeling dizzy.

When he looked back up, Link was studying him again, a deep furrow between his brows. Allen tilted his head quizzically, and Link asked, almost businesslike in his brusqueness, "When did you last eat?"

Allen's mouth twisted in a slight grimace, and he glanced away again. His stomach throbbed vengefully, and his fingers curled. "About three days ago," he said after a moment, not looking at Link. "That was when I got caught, and I couldn't move enough to reach." Not that that had stopped him from trying.

When he dared glance up again, Link was frowning. "Then that takes priority," he decided, rising. "You eat raw fish, don't you?"

Allen brightened and nodded quickly, never mind how it worsened his headache. Link nodded shortly in return and disappeared out the door.

Still on the ground, Allen fidgeted impatiently. For lack of anything better to do, he rubbed his fingers against the grain of the floor, which was harder and rougher than the driftwood he was used to. Parts of it were dark from where water had dampened it, but those spots were quickly drying out and fading into the rest again.

When he grew bored of that, he splayed his fingers out flat on the floor, mentally comparing them to Link's. Link's fingers were longer, he decided, and like with all humans, there was no webbing between them - bad for swimming, but far more dextrous than a merperson's hands, never mind the clawed fingers of a siren.

He looked up again as Link returned, a few large fish tucked under his arm, making Allen swallow. Link placed these beside him and Allen beamed.

"Thank you!" he exclaimed gratefully, eyes sparkling, and snatched the first of them up, biting into it eagerly.

There was a brief pause, and then Link snorted softly. Allen glanced up but didn't stop, and found himself puzzled by the look Link was giving him - an intense look, like he was something fascinating, but otherwise unreadable. All the human said, though, was, "Slow down. You'll make yourself sick."

Allen 'mm'ed and slowed down a little, but not by much. When he felt hands on his tail, he didn't jump, but he did look down curiously.

Link was taking advantage of his occupation to cut the bandages off of his tail, and, subconsciously, Allen slowed to a stop, silver eyes turning worried.

It was a little better than he'd thought it would be, but certainty not pretty. His scales were bent and cracked and crusted with blood, and the cuts were thin but fairly deep. On second inspection, the lines of stitches in his fin criss-crossed most of the surface, barely keeping it together.

Link caught his look and shook his head. "You'll be fine." Allen didn't miss the slight uncertainty in his voice, but before he could address it, Link continued, "Eat. You'll need strength to heal."

Uneasily, Allen nodded and went back to his food, only marginally less enthusiastic. Link quietly went about cleaning off the dried blood and then rewrapping the wound in fresh bandages, and then moved on to Allen's arm.

Allen finished the first fish and let Link have his injured arm, taking the second with his left, inevitably drawing Link's attention to it, if only for a brief moment.

Allen smiled reassuringly, swallowed the bite he'd taken, and said, "You really don't need to worry about it. This isn't the first time I've been caught in a net."

"And the last time, you got that?" Link asked, nodding at the blackened arm.

Allen nodded, though it wasn't precisely true. "It was an abandoned net, and I was young and on my own - maybe two or three years old at the time." It boggled his mind, now, that he hadn't managed to find anyone who would take him in for so long, but then it had been all he knew.

It was hard for a young merperson to live on their own, though some older ones did it - Cross, for one, though even he dropped in on the Order, the nearest of the merperson communities, occasionally. There were sharks, diseases, poisonous plants and fish - and, of course, nets and traps. The ghost net that had damaged his arm hadn't been the first incident, nor the last, but it had been the worst.

Sometimes he wondered how he'd survived to the age of seven.

"How old are you now?" Link asked. Allen could hear the frown in his voice and almost smiled.

"Fifteen," he answered easily. He flopped his tail experimentally. It hurt, but it didn't throb, and Allen smiled, satisfied.

"...Are you still on your own?"

He looked up, startled, to find Link frowning at him, hands paused in the motion of tying off the bandage on his arm, looking almost disturbed. Allen's eyes widened slightly, and he shook his head rapidly, almost making himself dizzy again.

"No, no! No, not anymore. There's a settlement not far from this town; I live there. There's about…" He considered. "Forty of us there, I think."

Link looked startled too now. "That many?"

Allen smiled and nodded. "That many."

Link remained still for a moment longer, and then shook himself and looked down again. He finished tying off the bandage while Allen finished the last fish, and then both of them stared at each other for a long moment with nearly equal apprehension.

Finally, Link make a hesitant motion forward, and Allen tilted his head to one side in implicit permission. One of Link's hands, much warmer than his own but only slightly different in texture, curled carefully around the back of his neck, and with the other, he cut the cloth away from Allen's neck in slow, cautious motions. Allen shivered.

"You're very cool," Link observed, and Allen nodded, a much more subtle motion than before. Link's fingers tucked under the now-loose cloth and pulled it away delicately.

"It's cold in the deep sea," Allen explained, keeping very still, suddenly feeling almost more nervous than when Link had first appeared in the room. "If I was as warm as you were, I'd freeze."

Link nodded thoughtfully, and then his hand returned with the same washcloth he'd used previously to clean the dried blood away. This time the motions made Allen wince slightly, but Link was gentle enough that it didn't hurt nearly as much as it might have.

Allen was far more tense now than he had been just moments before; it was almost jarring. From the furrow in Link's brow, the human had noticed, too.

"I'm not going to hurt you," Link assured him without looking. Allen swallowed, knowing that Link would be able to feel it.

"Okay," he whispered.

He remained still while Link finished cleaning his neck, and then, finally, the human removed his hand from Allen's neck. A moment later, the hands returned, starting the wind the bandage around.

"Tell me if I start to restrict your breathing," Link warned, and Allen nodded subtly again, wary of disturbing his work.

Both of them were silent this time, with only the feeling of Link's hands passing the roll around and around for occupation. Finally, Link tied this one off, too, and pulled away. Allen relaxed, tilted his head back, and smiled at Link.

"Thank you," he repeated softly.

Link avoided his gaze, color in his cheeks all over again. "You're welcome," he murmured, putting the supplies away. "Would you like to return to the tub now? I don't believe you're well enough to go home yet."

Allen sighed, but knew that Link was most likely correct. "Yes, please."

Link returned to his side and, with one hand under his shoulders and the other toward the top of his tail, picked him up with the same ease as before. Allen, this time not nearly as wary of being dropped, twisted slightly in his grip to look around curiously, though he caught only a glimpse of the room on the other side of the door before he was set down again in the water.

Allen let out a sigh of relief at the cool touch of the liquid, and tipped his head back to smile up at Link when the human straightened back up, looking composed once again. "Thank you."

Link nodded and asked, "Would you like me to bring you something to do? I'm afraid there's not much to offer, but I'd imagine it will get boring in here quite quickly."

Allen stifled a yawn and shook his head. "No, thank you. I think I'd rather sleep for a bit."

Link nodded again. "Then I'll return this evening to check on you. For now, I have to get back to work."

Allen nodded back and waved Link goodbye, and the blond man turned and left, closing the door behind him. Allen smiled at the closed door for a few moments, and then yawned again, folded his arms over the edge of the tub and set his head on his arms, and closed his eyes.

Link seemed… nice.

There! *firm nod* We've got some fluff yet before plot commences, so enjoy while the going's good. Relatively. *grin* Thanks for reading, and please review!